A Net for Small Fishes

by Lucy Jago

  ‘He was a man and a king,’ said the Earl of Suffolk.

  ‘Frances is a Howard and the King is fond of her, although he does not yet know of Mary Woods. He will not be hard to convince. It is quite wrong that Frances be imprisoned in a marriage with no hope of being made a mother. Essex has been heard talking openly of his father’s execution and of Lord Salisbury’s part in it, especially now Salisbury is not here to defend himself. His hatred encompasses us all. Our hopes of reconciliation through Frances’s marriage have not been realised and I am sure it is not through any lack on her part.’ He smiled at his niece and I thought of the leopard’s pelt.

  ‘There is no love in the marriage,’ she said.

  ‘You sound like a fool,’ snapped her mother. ‘Love comes with time and sacrifice. Essex is amongst the greatest earls in the country. Is that not enough for you? You are become greedy, and that is a very great fault. All this talk of love matches … Twaddle! Think of your own aunt Penelope. She was branded an adulteress, concubine and whore for her love of a man not her husband. Do you remember her face during those months, Frances? The scandal killed them both. Do you think it will be different for you?’

  I confess I had sympathy for the Countess’s fear on this point. How vicious is the spite of those who suspect another of having greater pleasure than are they. Arthur and I were always careful not to appear too happy in public.

  ‘There is no way to be rid of a husband and have one more to your liking unless you wish to follow Penelope down the path to oblivion. Will love sustain you through disgrace when your family name means nothing? Will your children be grateful for their poverty and loss of rank? Only husbands can prompt desire in their wives. Do you wish to be called a whore? My lord, I think you cannot have her best interests at heart when you talk of divorce. If she is free from Essex she will nag us to marry that primped Scotch puppy of the King’s.’

  Lord Suffolk, who had looked rather sleepy during his wife’s tirade, suddenly awoke. ‘What!’ he exploded, gaping first at his wife and then his daughter. ‘What!’ The Earl’s fury was so great he could not reach the words to voice it. Lord Northampton looked warningly at the Countess.

  ‘By God, husband, can you be so blind? The entire Court knows of it. The Lord Rochester has been making advances to Frances for years.’ I did not look at Frankie nor she at me, but we stiffened, like boys about to be whipped.

  ‘But he is the King’s man,’ said Lord Suffolk.

  ‘Indeed so,’ interrupted Lord Northampton. ‘With the passing of our cousin Salisbury and Prince Henry, God rest their souls, Robert Carr is now the primum mobile by whose motion all the other spheres must move or else stand still.’ Which was why Northampton was prepared to help Frankie rid herself of Essex; no other marriage could be as advantageous to the Howards as an alliance to the King’s favourite.

  ‘That mincing Scot in our family?’ shouted Lord Suffolk, standing up. Frankie and I stepped closer to each other. ‘Are your wits all eaten by fever? A page whose every penny is spent on the adornment of his body and the frizzing of his hair? I cannot understand a word that passes his lips. I wouldn’t have him muck out my horses. How dare he address my daughter!’

  ‘Quite, husband, quite. He’s been given Raleigh’s home, Westmorland’s land, he uses Sir Thomas Overbury’s wit and now he would take another man’s wife; nothing his own but ambition. I will have no further part in this business. Whatever plot you are hatching, my Lord Northampton, I do not give it my blessing, and for you – you who have given more succour to good Catholic families in this realm than any other man – to seek the divorce of your own great-niece, I would not have thought it possible. I wonder if you are quite well.’

  ‘We must indeed consider the matter of Sir Thomas Overbury,’ said Lord Northampton, entirely unmoved by her speech.

  ‘That vicious weasel? Why?’ asked Frankie’s father, growing increasingly distressed.

  ‘He has overstepped himself,’ said Lord Northampton. ‘Since returning to Court he brags that, were it not for him, Carr would have neither fortune, wit nor reputation.’

  ‘Probably true,’ acceded Frankie’s father.

  ‘“Carr leads the King but Overbury leads Carr” is a pretty saying that has come to the King’s ears.’ Although his expression changed not a jot, it was clear that Lord Northampton himself was the conduit. ‘The King dislikes Overbury for too conceited a carriage of his recent good fortune. His best friends speak indifferently of him. He is an insolent, thrasonical man, possessed by ambition and vainglory. He is nought and corrupt. He caused a rift between myself and Sir Richard Morrison for which I soundly rebuked him.’

  ‘He uses Carr for his own advancement,’ agreed Frankie.

  Her father began to splutter again. ‘Do you meddle now in politics, Frankie? Will you be carrying a sword next?’

  ‘Overbury befriended Carr when the young Scot was an insignificant page with no expectations,’ said Lord Northampton, ignoring his nephew. ‘He is your greatest rival, Frances, for his success depends entirely on Carr’s love.’

  Lord Suffolk sank on to his chair and rubbed his eyes, as if to scrub away the thought of Carr loving Overbury. ‘How is it possible?’ he said, to no one in particular.

  ‘Divorce is not possible for the English, with the rarest exceptions,’ said Lord Northampton. ‘However, if one studies the decretals relating to matrimony advanced by Pope Gregory the Ninth in the thirteenth century …’ here Frankie’s father cleared his throat ‘… by which term, “decretals”, I mean a papal decree concerning a point of canon law. It is stated that if a husband testifies under oath that he is impotent, and his wife confirms his admission, then their marriage can be annulled. Of course, should Essex later put a child on another woman, then he will have committed perjury and will be forced to take Frances back.’

  ‘I can testify that Essex is impotent,’ she said.

  ‘Only a man’s testimony is taken into account. A woman can only confirm,’ replied Lord Northampton.

  ‘Why would any man admit impotency if he is thereby barred from taking another wife for fear he prove virile with her?’ she asked.

  ‘Indeed, that is the difficulty,’ nodded Lord Northampton. ‘However, in his commentary, Thomas Aquinas provides us with a path through the maze. He states that if a man and wife have lived together three years without consummating their marriage, this could be taken as proof that the husband is victim to witchcraft. A man, being a rational being, has control of his body unless otherwise tampered with by some external force, such as a witch. The Church would then be able to dissolve the marriage and both husband and wife would be free to remarry, on the supposition that the witchcraft concerned only the relations between the man and his wife, not with another woman he might marry subsequently. Both you and Essex could agree to that, I suppose?’

  Frankie appeared unsure.

  ‘Might people not assume that it was I who encouraged a witch to subject my husband to evil influences?’

  ‘It would be a brave man who accused a Howard of maleficum,’ snorted Lord Suffolk, seeming to forget that even as he spoke a woman lay in prison for theft of a diamond ring used by Frankie to secure services of a magical nature. I wondered anew that this man, with wits so few, had charge of the country. The Earl of Northampton, on the other hand, had the memory of a wronged fishwife. He stared at Frankie.

  ‘Your question is a sensible one, Frances, but I fear only you know the answer to it. If people did, as you fear, assume it was you who subjected Lord Essex to maleficum, would they have reason? Or, perhaps more importantly, would they have evidence beyond the ring you gave to Mary Woods?’

  ‘How can this end well?’ said the Countess, surprising me with the note of care in her voice. She approached and took Frankie’s hand, a gesture that seemed to embarrass her daughter. ‘Forget the plays and poems that lead you to romantic notions. Romance is as mist, fragile and disappearing with the slightest wind, the slightest heat. You will stir
up our enemies if you seek to divorce Essex. The Queen will be amongst their ranks, Essex and all his allies, the Bishops, all haters of Catholics and of the Cecils, and countless others we cannot imagine. It has never been done that I remember, and most especially not by a woman. Even if you achieve your wish, you will pay too high a price for it. Your reputation will be forfeit and without that you will be an exile, as if dead. Learn to love Essex. He will give you a child if you win him over. That is the way, Frankie, that is the way.’ She waited for her daughter to look her in the eye, to squeeze her hand, to give some acknowledgement of her words, but Frankie stared at the floor without moving.

  The Countess dropped her daughter’s hand and looked to me to open the door. I am not a servant, so I did not move. She opened it herself, and with that moment of pride I lost many commissions to dress Court ladies.

  As the door closed, Frankie turned to her great-uncle.

  ‘Other than the words of the washerwoman, and my ring, there is no proof that I have attempted to be rid of my husband.’

  Lord Northampton gave her a hard look and turned to her father.

  ‘Then we shall petition the King to establish a Commission to discuss the annulment of Frankie’s marriage. It seems to be for the best,’ concluded Lord Northampton. I had thought him fond of his niece; now I suspected that the notice he paid to Frankie was solely because she was of use to him.

  Her father looked at Frankie with love and doubt; he was close to crying.

  ‘I would speak to your father alone,’ said Northampton, and we quit the room.

  ‘Would that I had kept you away from Mary Woods,’ I said as we made our way downstairs. I was to be married the next day but did not remind Frankie of it for fear it would upset her; there were still so many obstacles to her own happiness.

  ‘She has prompted my family to action. The scandal will be forgotten.’ I knew that would not be so, because it shook the ladder on which we all perched; her mutiny against those who ruled her and the God who decreed it should be so, would find few sympathisers.

  Her coach was in the courtyard and we proceeded immediately to Whitehall, where Robin Carr’s steward awaited us.

  ‘My lady,’ he said quietly, ‘Viscount Rochester awaits you. I can take you to him.’

  Robert Carr had been in Royston with the King for several weeks, hunting. It was the first time they had met since the Mary Woods scandal broke and I wondered how he would greet her.

  ‘Frankie, I will return home,’ I said, keen to finish preparations for the morrow and relieve old Maggie of the care of the children.

  ‘Please stay, I need your company.’

  By which she meant I was to act as a chaperone in this palace of gossip. The steward led us to an apartment that was under renovation and empty. By the time I entered the chamber, Robin and Frankie were kissing. The steward withdrew and I sat in the window and pretended not to be there. In between kisses, Frankie said: ‘I have wondrous news.’

  I admired his agility, for it was merely a momentary pause in his smile, but I saw fear cross Carr’s features. Did he think she was carrying his child?

  ‘My Lord Northampton will seek an annulment for me.’

  He tucked a curl behind his ear several times as he gazed at her. His face showed not fear any more, but bewilderment. It was a strange tableau. A perfumed creature of the King adored by a woman whose strength of purpose exceeded his own.

  ‘Can it be done? By a wife?’

  ‘No. My Lord Northampton and my father must pursue it,’ she said, an edge to her voice that I knew to be disappointment. She had expected her lover to cheer, not to ask procedural questions.

  ‘Your great-uncle is the last man I would expect to consider an annulment for anyone, especially his own kin,’ he said.

  ‘Are you happy at the news?’ prompted Frankie.

  He could have smiled and kissed her, whatever his doubts, as a real courtier would have done. But Robert Carr was more honest than that.

  ‘Frank, my love, be careful. Essex is the son of a hero, however deep his faults. Your union will be picked over like a barrel of apples. It is you who will be found rotten, not because that is the truth but because it is always so. More will condemn a wife who disobeys her lord than a husband who misuses his wife.’

  Frankie began to twist the lace on one cuff. She turned from him and sat in the window. ‘The King does everything he can to promote marriages between his Scotch and English subjects.’

  ‘I’m the King’s man, Frank. I’m with him under sun and moon now the Prince is gone. Everything I have comes from him and can be taken away by him.’

  I felt for Carr as he stood looking sadly at Frankie’s back, wanting so much to please, pulled in all directions. Since finding favour with the King, he turned everything to gold for others, but was unable to gratify himself.

  ‘I want us to be together in God’s sight,’ she said, very quietly.

  Carr went to her then and stroked her hair. ‘I am afraid for you, is all. You … we must tread very carefully. The Court is alive with vipers, many with a grudge towards your family.’ She turned and rested against him like a hawk on the wind.

  For several hours they talked quietly and I lay, dozing, on a folded dust sheet, thinking of all the things I had to do for the morrow. Each time I suggested we leave, one or other of them begged me to stay a little longer. They had been apart for weeks and had much to discuss, including the possible annulment, which held much danger but perhaps also a chance for their happiness.

  It was nearly midnight when Carr finally put on his cloak and we accompanied Frankie to her apartment. After that, he offered me his coach to take me home, by way of thanks for my patience, but I refused, not wanting the inhabitants of my street woken by the sound of a carriage. What tittle-tattle would follow the sight of me arriving home after curfew in a nobleman’s conveyance?

  As we walked together through the dark courtyards of the palace, slippery with the moss and slime of winter months, I pictured myself at the door to Arthur’s manor, looking at the children running through his fields to the wide, sunlit horizons beyond. He had described to me the air of the place, perfumed by Persian roses he had planted all along the front of the house, and the avenue of beech that separated his home from the rest of the world.

  ‘You!’

  I was wrenched from dreaming by Sir Thomas Overbury, who stood not ten paces away. As his eyes moved from Carr to me, his choler appeared to double. He shouted, for the whole palace to hear: ‘That is her procuress! You’ve been with that base woman!’

  A knot of servants standing a few paces behind Overbury fell silent. Great heat flared up inside me. Overbury’s insult to me was grave, but that offered Frankie was unpardonable, as was clear from the servants’ shocked faces.

  Carr walked up to Overbury, waving at the servants to leave as he did so. Overbury held a large scroll in one hand but with the other he gripped Carr’s arm, shouting all the while.

  ‘I’ve been working all night on this …’ He shook the parchment under Carr’s nose. ‘I search in vain for you to sign it, worry what has befallen you, and all the while you’ve been lying with that notorious baggage … Do you not know that the value of property is diminished if shared?’

  ‘I hope you have no plans for the morrow,’ Carr said loudly, turning to me, ‘you’ll be fair beat.’

  ‘I am getting married,’ I said, fury provoking a reply when normally I would have stayed silent.

  ‘In truth?’ said Carr, surprised enough to forget Overbury for a moment, even though the man was still jerking his arm. ‘Then I insist you take my coach,’ he said, pleased for me even in the midst of Overbury’s tirade.

  ‘You give suck to the gadabed’s bawd?’ Overbury shouted, dropping Carr’s arm. His pale face flickered in the torchlight like a malevolent devil, his black clothes disappearing into the shadows. The injury he did me pricked like a spur, perhaps because there was truth in it, but I replied to Carr as if I had h
eard nothing. Frankie had taught me the power of being inscrutable.

  ‘Thank you, my lord, I will take it gladly.’

  A strange noise escaped from Overbury, something between a snort and a squeal. He snatched up his gloves, leather with stiff cuffs, and slapped Carr hard across the face with them. Carr was so astonished it took him a while to speak.

  ‘You hit me now?’ he said, incredulous.

  ‘Behave as a child, be chastised as one.’ Overbury’s arrogance had swollen fit to burst since his being readmitted to Court, even though it was only Carr’s intervention with the King that had brought it about. ‘If you’d rather demean yourself with that doxy than work on the King’s business, agree to what you owe me and I’ll leave you to truck with the whore’s servant,’ he spat.

  ‘You’d not have a penny were it not for me!’ shouted Carr, finally riled. He snatched the gloves from Overbury’s hand and threw them as far as he could across the courtyard.

  ‘You won’t manage without me. You’ll crawl back.’

  ‘I have legs of my own to stand on,’ retorted Carr.

  ‘Did you think you could keep it secret from me? You are bewitched, there can be no other cause for your madness. Be rid of her.’

  ‘You think you’re the King now? He’s the only one can tell me what to do!’

  As they insulted each other, the watchful servants memorised every word. In the morning, the whole Court would know that Sir Thomas Overbury had accused the Countess of Essex of being a base whore. Had Overbury stabbed Frankie, he would not have inflicted greater damage. The only escape from such defamation was to be offered a full and public apology or else for her to kill herself. Even without evidence, and in full knowledge of the accuser’s spite and jealousy, he could ruin Frankie with those two words.